


Destiny Pentober 2020

by TomGLFan2814



Category: Destiny (Video Games)
Genre: Destinytober (Destiny), Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-30
Updated: 2020-10-30
Packaged: 2021-03-09 02:20:06
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,540
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27287053
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TomGLFan2814/pseuds/TomGLFan2814
Summary: A collection of short pieces from the Destiny Pentober 2020 prompts made by @newbabyfly. Featuring my Destiny OCs.  It's my first time trying to write to someone else's theme every day.  I am proud that I did not miss a single day for my first time out!
Relationships: Ghost/Guardian (Destiny)





	Destiny Pentober 2020

#1 YOUR GUARDIAN

Gilfan could never make sense of the images that sometimes came bursting into his mind upon waking. Green light. A last battle beside fellow warriors. A voice screaming, “There’s too many of ‘em!” Too much to make sense of, and yet somehow, not enough. His Ghost would shine a soft light his way and ask, “Are you OK?”

“Yeah,” he’d say. Just the…same old stuff. Again.”

There would be a pause and then he’d ask, yet again, “Are you sure there’s nothing more you can tell me? About how I got here? About how I got…this way?”

“I’ve told you all I know,” said the Ghost. “I found you on Mars. There was a lot of debris. The space we were in wasn’t going to be safe for much longer, but I sensed an Exo there. I sensed…you.”

“Was there anything else there? Anything you haven’t told me?”

“You were near a download station. The data was too damaged to be of much help. You were some sort of fighter. You fell in the first stages of the Collapse. You chose to become Exo. You didn’t…boot up, and you stayed there until I found you. Thank the Traveler that I did.”

His Ghost didn’t tell him about the ring that was found next to him. He never would.

#2 YOUR GHOST

“Why ‘Tomar’?” the Ghost asked.

“What?” asked Gilfan.

“Why did you name me ‘Tomar’?”

“Did I?”

“Yes. When I first Woke you, you called me ‘Tomar.’ You kept calling me by that name the whole time we were escaping the Cabal in the Martian Download Facility.

“Huh. I seem to remember that I had a friend by that name. A good friend. No, a neighbor. No, a, a what, a comrade in arms. I was somewhat disoriented when you first…encountered me. I was seeing things, memories, I suppose, but only in flashes, only instants of light. Green light, it was. I think you reminded me of my friend, right from the beginning. I don’t know how I know, but I know, I KNOW, that we saved each other’s lives, more than once. When you first woke me, you sounded just like Tomar. Something in your voice. That’s all I know.”

“I’m glad you came up with that. I certainly prefer it to ‘Ghost’.”

“I’m glad too.”

#3 OFF DUTY

Back from Io. Time spent with Eris in the Cradle could be rewarding, but was always exhausting. This Hunter needs to make the rounds in the Tower just to decompress a little before going back out. First the Hangar to check on the Colonel. Holliday is looking after him all right, but she is always so busy. And easily distracted. I sneak him some treats, then throw a wave over to Saint. Not in the mood for a big hug or to be told I am “so smol.” 

Up the flights of stairs to see Banshee. Hit my Vault to switch a few things around. Look over to see Zavala and Shaxx being…Zavala and Shaxx. Not in the mood for them, either. Nothing for Rahool. He doesn’t notice me, and I don’t attract his gaze. No mail. Also not in the mood for Tess right now. I swear, one more Fenchurch story and I’ll leap over her counter. Realizing that maybe I should have gone to the Farm instead. Had no idea how foul my mood was.

Down to the Bazaar. Ikora seems deep in thought as usual. I never have any idea how to approach her. A quick check-in with Hawthorne regarding some clan business. I swear, some days I think the coolest being in the Tower is Louis. 

As long as I’m here, I should probably go see Drifter. Most days he rubs me the wrong way, but today he’s exactly what I need. I promise to check out his latest tweaks to Gambit. Maybe I actually will.

I’m tired. I don’t want to see Ada. Hell, I don’t even want to see the Sweeperbot. There’s nothing here for me. I call Tomar and we ‘mat up to the ship. I realize that the Tower is not where i need to be after all.

We Jump to Titan, I climb up the Rig as high as I possibly can, and we watch the sea monsters. It’s exactly what I needed.

#4 JUMP SHIP

“I hate our ship,” Tomar groused.

Gilfan was surprised. “What?? Why?”

“It’s too small. It looks like a bloody dragonfly. It’s impractical. It wouldn’t stand up to a sneeze, let alone an attack.”

“I like that it looks like a dragonfly. I think Bayle’s Aerodyne is classy. Not a lot of Guardians favor it, I grant you, but that’s one thing I like about it. When my fireteam goes planetside, anyone observing knows which one is us.”

“You never even gave the Woomera B-5 a chance!” Tomar was petulant and adamant, not a good combination.

“The Woomera looked like a boomerang and flew like a brick. No style at all.”

“Well, what about Symmetry Flight?”

“At the time, everybody had one. Not interested.”

“Well, what was wrong with the Sails of Osiris?”

“It looked like it hadn’t been finished. There was cabling all over the place.”

“Kabr’s Glass Aegis?”

“Was slowly turning into glass. Not interested. There’s nothing wrong with the Aerodyne. C’mon, let’s go to Mercury. You can never sulk for long in the Lighthouse.”

“Fine. But I’m driving.”

“No."

#5 CABAL

I know a Guardian who was Arisen in the Cosmodrome and was attacked by Fallen before she knew what the hell was happening. She always hated those four-armed bastards more than anyone else. I guess the same thing happened to me with the Cabal. My Ghost found me deep in a Bray download facility next to some rusting Golden Age hardware just as the Cabal were invading it, looking for whatever the hell they were always looking for on Mars. To a lot of Guardians they were just Space Rhinos. To me, they were the bastards trying to kill me as soon as I was born. Reborn. Whatever.

So I hated them long before the Red Legion came. I had a special hate for the Cabal who had been Taken. If Tomar and I were Doing A Thing and a Taken Centurion showed up, it got all of my attention. Not always the smartest course of action, but I never claimed to be anything more than what I am. Taken Psions were not much better, those jittery self-cloning s.o.b.’s, but the Centurions were the ones that really set me off.

And then Ghaul showed up, with his Almighty ship, destroying the Tower, killing the Speaker…cutting off my Light. Sending him to whatever Hell the Cabal might believe in was the best thing I ever did. I still have dreams. Yes, Exos have dreams. Most times they’re just images and flashes that make no sense, but when they DO make sense, I’m back in that subbasement on Mars, running for my life, looking for a weapon, any weapon, a length of pipe, anything, trying to make it to the surface where there MIGHT be an old hangar which MIGHT have an old ship which MIGHT be able to fly again…. Nuts.

It was bad enough the first time. No sense going over it again.

#6 FAVORITE EMOTE

There’s this weird thing Guardians do. Asher Mir calls it a “paracausal power” which is the old mad scientist’s way of saying it’s magic. I think it’s something we developed a long time ago with the help of our Ghosts and the Traveler’s Light as a way of communicating with each other when we needed to maintain radio silence in the field. Or maybe to play charades. I don’t know. In any event, we are able to manipulate energy in such a way as to create temporary holographic constructs. This always gives me a chill, a real somebody-just-walked-on-my-grave chill, because it seems so very familiar and yet just out of my memory’s reach. Like I could somehow do this, manipulate energy and make things, in my previous life, the life I had before I became Exo. Which is crazy. I asked Tomar about it, since he knows so much more history than I do, and he just does that little bob in the air that is the Ghost equivalent of a shrug. As far as he knows, this kind of energy manipulation was not common even in the Golden Age.

As to my favorite — it’s something I call “Poultry Petting.” Whenever I visit the Tower, usually the first thing I do is go to the Hangar and look in on The Colonel. I try to always have a treat for him. There is something incredibly comforting about picking him up and showing him a little cuddly love. I know he enjoys it, I know he misses Cayde as much as any of us. When I’m in the field and I need a moment to decompress, I call up an image of the Colonel and pet him a little and whatever is bothering me is soothed. And it reminds me that “even the meekest among us deserve to be cared for.”

#7 SOLAR/VOID/ARC

Solar, Void or Arc. At one time or another, I have followed each of those paths. When I first Arose, I tried being a Gunslinger. Cayde-6 was my Vanguard, he was an Exo like me, and he was unparalleled in his use of the Golden Gun. I wanted to be just like him. I wasn’t. I just wasn’t. Couldn’t make it last long enough, even with enhancements from my armor, to be much good when it counted. So I tried following the path of the Arcstrider next. This seemed to suit me much better. I loved spinning that Staff and racing through a field full of enemies and sending them into the next Realm one after another, zap, zap, zap. It was both exhilarating and liberating.

For a long time I resisted Lord Shaxx’s attempts to recruit me for the Crucible. When I finally relented, the first thing I learned was that, as much as I loved my Arc Staff, the other fireteam could see me coming a mile away. My fighting style was never subtle, and my lack of stealth did me no favors in the Crucible. I thought about just quitting on Shaxx, but something made me go back for one more try…as a Nightstalker.

Following the Path of the Nightstalker took me Home. A Cabal boss had once dropped me an Exotic engram. Master Rahool decoded it into an armor piece that I could actually use, something he called a Gwisin Vest. I took that into the Crucible and I felt like I had finally become the Hunter I was always intended to be by the Traveler. The first time I used my Spectral Blades I knew there was no going back, not for me. The Void calls to me. The weight of it pulls at me always. I cannot claim to understand its dark secrets or to fully understand the vastness of its secrets. But when I pull Void Light into my daggers and all but vanish from sight, I feed that emptiness with my enemies. And that is enough.

#8 DANCE PARTY

Dead Orbit throws the best dance parties.

There. I said it.

They turn their little corner of the Hangar into the best disco this side of the Golden Age.

At one time or another, I’ve aligned with each of the Tower factions. New Monarchy can only claim to having the best food (and drinks) at their parties, but…it’s all about what you’re wearing, what shader you’re using and who you’re seen with. (Oh, excuse me, “with whom you are being seen.”)

The less said about Future War Cult, the better. Hell, I’m Exo, and even I think they’re a bunch of stiffs. [Insert “Doing the Robot joke here.] I would rather just hang out with Eris. At least she has good stories.

No, there’s something about the mix of loud music, cheap hootch and drunken nihilistic poetry being loudly proclaimed from every corner that makes for…a really, really good party. And you get Dire Promise in your goodie bag when you leave.

#9 ARMORING UP

All of my Hunter friends and clanmates have different ideas about armor, especially Exotics, since we can only wear one at a time. (I heard that there was once a magic cloak that let you wear two but I don’t believe it.) Many Hunters swear by the Liar’s Handshake gauntlets: take a punch and then deliver a one-punch kill. Which also heals you. Not bad, I admit. But I don’t like getting hit. 

Everybody tweaks their armor to suit their style, too. Some try to max out mobility, or to get their supers or grenades to recharge as quickly as possible. I guess I’m an idiot. My Ghost Tomar tells me I have the soul of a Titan in the shell of a Hunter. My armor is almost always chosen to max out my Resilience. Like I said, I don’t like getting hit. I’m not fast, I’m not subtle, but I’m tough. The individual pieces don’t matter too much to me. I don’t care what they look like, because I almost always change how they look with a mod from Tess anyway. Right now I’m wearing the Siegebreak mods, except for my cloak. That’s Empyrean Cartographer. It’s not only fun to say, it has a quiver for my bow. Unless I’m going to one of Eva’s fancy-dress celebrations, I tend to shade things with an eye toward camouflage. I especially like green. Always have. So Gambit Emerald is on everything, even my ride.

But we were talking about Exotics. I almost never use a helmet (“But Foetracer! But Celestial Nighthawk!” Yeah, I hear you) or boots. I’m a Chest Guy. I follow the path of the Nightstalker and I wear the Gwisin Vest that some Cabal boss dropped. If I know I’m going to be using my bow a LOT, I might swap it out for the Oathkeepers. But that’s rare. My other stats are OK, all at least 50% or higher. But mostly I. Am. Resilient.

#10 DEFEND

The Vanguard is interesting, if nothing else. Most of the time I just go out looking for trouble and stomping it out as best as Tomar and I can. Sometimes, though, there are missions. Zavala or Ikora or even Banshee will need something done, and ask me to do it. That’s usually how things work, at least when there’s no major crisis coming to a head. It’s “Go there, get this, stop that, find this before they do, bring it back to me/him/Asher/Eris so we can Do A Thing.” Apart from the task itself, I’m only responsible for myself and my fireteam, if I’m part of one.

But when the Red Legion attacked us out of nowhere, that was different. That was defending what was ours. And we failed. Ghaul took our Light, took our Speaker, and left our beautiful Tower a burning ruin. The only good thing that came out of that attack was being able to get as many residents of the Last City to a safe place as we could. It wasn’t that many. A lot of civilians died. Even more are still missing.

I did learn a lesson that day. Yeah, it made me hate the Cabal even more than I already did, but that’s not what I’m talking about. I realized that all the “go here, do that” stuff we do has a reason. Those people we see wandering our streets, welding our catwalks and chatting in the Bazaar? They are what’s important. They are why we are called Guardians. They are why we Defend.

# 11 SPARROW

Oh, man. I have tried so many sparrows. Right now I’m running a Braytech Dream9 with a Gambit Emerald shader. It arrives instantly, handles like a dream, and it is, if I do say so myself, the fastest thing I’ve ever driven in this Solar System. There is nothing more fun than shooting off a ramp on Nessus and seeing how many barrel rolls I can get in before taking a bath in the Radiolarian lake there.

But it’s not my one and only. I’m always looking for the next thing that tickles me. And for the silliest reasons, sometimes. I love Approaching Infinity…because of the exhaust. I love Lunatic’s Legacy, because sometimes a crotch rocket needs to be an actual rocket. And I love Brumeswept Night because it’s a freaking flying broomstick. And I live for the day when Holliday mods my Jotuneer so that it shoots like a heavy pike. We haven’t figured out the “CLANG” yet. A sparrow that looks like a flying Jotunn has to go “CLANG!”

Vespulaser. Another one with great exhaust. Love to do doughnuts with that one. Burnout. “Fight fire with fire.” Eon Drive. Got that Golden Age vibe. I love them all. I wish the Sparrow Racing League was still running; I’d love to try out any or all of those in competition. But as long as it comes as soon as I call it, as long as it handles well, as long as I can do tricks when the mood hits me…I’m happy. For now I’ll cruise around on my Braytech, with those fantastic anti-grav pads glowing blue as I zip along. At least until the next new sparrow catches my eye.

Or Amanda figures out that Jotuneer mod….

#12 FALLEN

The Eliksni are not my favorite enemy, but they aren’t the worst. [See: CABAL. I hate those rhino bastards.] Some of them are actually okay. I have no problems with the Spider or his crew. One hand washes the other, I always say. Or in Spider’s case, washes the other washes the other washes the other. Skolas and Variks are okay. So is Mithrax. Mind you, I don’t trust any of them further than I could throw them, which in the Spider’s case, isn’t very far at all. They don’t break their word to you once you have it, but you need to parse the agreements very, very carefully because if there is a loophole, or an opportunity for them to leave out some essential bit of information, they will take advantage of it. In my experience.

One thing I’ve learned (after Mithrax nearly took my head off over it) is that they do NOT like being referred to as “Fallen.” Many of them have a deep, abiding, unreasoning hatred of humanity and Guardians because the Traveler left them and came to us. I’ve overheard mention of something they call The Whirlwind, but never got much in the way of detail, at least no consistent detail. As near as I can tell, things went bad for them with their Houses at war with one another.

So, Fallen? Good fighters. Dangerous. Even more dangerous when Taken, especially their Captains, but even one lone Dreg can be enough to take you down. Vandal snipers are absolutely deadly.

And that thing where they zip past you running on all six limbs? It never, ever, ever fails to creep me the hell out. 

#13 THROW MORE GRENADES!

Eva Levante is a weird lady. There is more to her than the Kindly Grandma persona she likes to project. I remember one time during some Festival or other she rigged things so that your Guardian grenade energy recharged almost immediately. Which was great in the Festival area. But it turned out you could use the perk OUTSIDE the Festival and still have nearly continuous grenades.

I spent a week throwing grenades at every possible target. 

Even targets that would otherwise have been easy shots with other weapons.

Ridiculous.

Normally, I am not a grenade guy. I am a Nightstalker. We do not have grenades that seek out targets like Arcstriders and Gunslingers do. We have grenades that need to be carefully placed to be useful. Grenades that require a little finesse, a little skill, to use effectively. I’ve often said that I am probably one of the most un-subtle Hunters in the Vanguard. I don’t do finesse, unless you count a shot to the head with my bow from half a mile away, or a stab in the back from a spectral blade.

But if I EVER figure out how Eva did it, I’m going to Gunslinger Swarm Grenade everything I see.

Like I said, ridiculous.

#14 WEAPON LOADOUT

Obviously, the loadout depends on the activity. But when I don’t know what I’m getting into, I do have a standard loadout that works for me as a Nightstalker. My primary weapon is my favorite auto rifle of the day. Probably Breakneck, but might be a Braytech Werewolf, might be Forward Path. Whatever it is, it will have anti-barrier if it’s in season, it will have good range, it will have superb stability, and it will have a decent sized magazine. Rampage if I can get it. If I use an Exotic in my Primary slot, though, it’ll be a hand cannon. Crimson. Ace of Spades.

Energy weapon is a ranged weapon. Almost always a bow, almost always Trinity Ghoul, yes, taking up my Exotic slot, but totally worth it. Trinity can take out snipers and it is brilliant at clearing mobs. It’s saved my Exo rear on more than one occasion when my shields and health were down to almost nothing. If I have to use another Exotic someplace else, I’ll fill that slot with Subtle Calamity, probably my favorite “regular” bow. Archer’s Tempo, Rampage and Exploding Arrowheads. I love it.

My default power weapon is usually a sword. Lately I’m favoring Falling Guillotine, but if I have room for an Exotic, Black Talon does the job. If I know I’m going to be going up against a big chunky boss at a distance, I might use a rocket launcher with a tracking module. Pyroclastic Flow with a Reload masterwork is great. For an Exotic, I like Two-Tailed Fox.

So, unless I have a specific destination or mission in mind, you’ll see me with Breakneck, Trinity, and Guillotine. They’ve never let me down yet.

#15 FAVORITE LOCATION

This was an easy one. Titan. No contest, no question. Titan.

Titan is beautiful. Even the wrecked buildings have a certain tarnished glory to them. The Arcology is one of the saddest, most beautiful locations in the Solar System. It reminds me a lot of Venus and the Ishtar Collective ruins there, for some reason.

I love the methane seas. I love the rain. I love the subtle tang of ammonia in the atmosphere.

I love the views.

There is nothing finer than climbing up to the highest point you can reach and looking out over the sea. The waves are magnificent. When there’s nothing pressing, it’s Titan that I go to. Some people like people watching. Some people like bird watching. Some people take comfort from watching pigeons (hey, Saint.) Me? I watch the sea monsters on Titan. So far I’ve never actually spotted whatever passes for their faces or heads, only their long serrated backs as they breach the surface. But I’ve never given up. 

(Someday, I’m gonna ride one.)

#16 FIRETEAM

I’m sorry to report to the Vanguard that, as far as fireteams go, I don’t have one. I’ve been part of one many times, but I don’t have a regular team that I raid or mission with. It’s not that I’m a loner (at least, it’s not JUST that I’m a loner) but I’ve been burned so many times. And you know what? Life Is Too Short, even a life that can be resurrected over and over again, to deal with nonsense. I’ve left fireteams that harassed fem Guardians. I’ve left fireteams that were just in general abusive to, let’s say, the less able members of the team. I just feel like I have better ways to spend my time.

It always amazes me when a Guardian has such sharp memories of their “other” lives. Mine are always just hazy, green flashes. But I remember jumping onto a random fireteam for an Escalation Protocol. I was with a Guardian who remembered that she was a 55-year-old mom from a planet called Chicago and another, a Hunter, who remembered that he was a dog walker from a place called Philadelphia. And they were brilliant, absolutely brilliant, and we took the Protocol all the way to the end, and much-desired weapon engrams dropped from the final chest, and it was the most fun I’d ever had with others. Another time, I responded to a Warsat mission request on Luna. Four fireteams of three, all coordinated by a master strategist. (It wasn’t me.) We got Rasputin’s warsats built in record time, no casualties, at least six times. One Hunter never spoke a word, just did the job and vanished when we were done. Never saw them again. Hope to, though; wicked fine fighter.

So my fireteams are pretty random. Probably why I don’t raid. I guess I need to do something about that. I just reminded myself that there are plenty of great Vanguard out there.

#17 VEX

My Ghost, Tomar, says to me the other day, “You know, Gil, I don’t think the Vex are so bad, apart from the whole wanting to transform entire planets thing.”

Sometimes I want to grab the nearest stick and swat him.

Vex are one of those aliens that we will never understand, never be able to really talk to, never find common ground with. In the Ishtar Collective library there is mention of an alien species, the Kicx, that are descended from herd animals. They killed every other competing life form on their world and view every other sentient species as potential predators or as competition. And predators and competition are not tolerated. They don’t talk to you, they don’t warn you off, they reject any and all attempts at communication; they just keep trying to kill you until they do, or until you go away, or until you kill every one of them instead. An entire world of angry bulls. And we have more in common with them than we do with the Vex.

So yeah, Vex cyborgs from before the dawn of time, who won’t talk to you and who only exist to follow their programming, which says they need to take over the entire universe. Lovely.

Kick ‘em all into a black hole, says I, and let them trouble some other universe.

#18 KILLED BY ARCHITECT

Let’s just say I never met a cliff I couldn’t fall off.

Or a high ledge. Or a mountain. Or any kind of edge without a railing. Or with a railing [See: Failed Jumps/Tower.]

Never.

Not on Mercury. I fell there backing away while trying to line up a shot.

Not in the Infinite Forest. Oh, Traveler, definitely not in the Infinite Forest.

Into the chasm near Devrim’s perch. Into the methane sea on Titan. Into the underground ice canyon on Mars. Off of more edges and ledges on Nessus than I can remember.

I don’t know who the Architects are, but if I had a Strange Coin for every time they killed me and brought me back I could buy out Xür and take over his business.

At least I finally learned when not to shoot a rocket launcher.

#19 RAMEN EATING CONTEST

There are ramen shops all over the Last City. Shoot, Tomar says there are even ramen vending machines here and there in out of the way places, if you know where to look. I can’t imagine getting ramen out of a machine, though.

I went to the place Cayde used to favor last week. They make a spicy chicken ramen bowl that would make my eyes water if I wasn’t Exo. They rub the chicken with a this secret mix of spices, all of them pure fire, and the chicken gets sliced into the ramen on top of the noodles at the end. The cook likes me because I know the difference between gochujang and sriracha. (It’s a big difference. Ask anybody.) Anyway, if I could pick one thing to survive from the Golden Age, it’d be this ramen recipe.

I saw a ramen eating contest in the Last CIty once. A bunch of Awoken Titans were getting into it with a bunch of Human Hunters, you know how it goes. Before it got to the point where furniture was going to be broken over heads, the proprietor yells, “Only way to settle this is with contest! Pick champion!” So this giant Awoken guy comes over to the counter, and a minute later, this little slip of a Hunter comes over too. Well, the Awoken think this is hilarious; they start laughing and joking about how they’ve got this, they’ve totally got this. Me, I start quietly working the crowd, offering three to one on the Hunter. They think I’m an idiot who’s just overly loyal to the Hunter Vanguard and they’re happy to take my money. The chef starts slamming bowls of this spicy chicken ramen onto the counter. The Awoken guy starts sweating and blowing before he’s half finished. Meanwhile the Hunter puts it all away in nothing flat. Then she asks for another. Ten minutes later she’s up by three bowls. Fifteen minutes, and the Awoken folds. Whatever else you want to say about it, the owner made a good call; any violence between Titans and Hunters was completely defused.

Me, I collected my winnings, sent a share over to the winner and then got out of there before anything got ugly. I took off down the road to another little place and had me a big bowl of you-know-what.

#20 A FALLEN COMRADE

I’m betting a lot of Hunters are going to see this and tell you about Cayde-6. And I admit that Cayde was the first “fallen comrade” to come to mind. Cayde did not have a good death. I still don’t know why Uldren and the Barons singled him out the way they did, to go out that way. There is still a huge hole where he used to be, in the Vanguard, in the Tower, in my heart. I would resurrect Uldren Sov just so I could kill him again, and then kick his dead, pale blue ass so hard he’d land in the Ascendant Plane.

But there I go, when I meant to leave Cayde to others who can write better and tell better stories. No, the fallen comrade I meant to tell you about was Taeko-3.

Taeko was not a Hunter. She was pretty cocky, she was a Warlock, and an Exo, and a member of the Praxic Warlocks. They are a pretty great bunch, for Warlocks. Once, they gave me a Sparrow for some chore or other I did for them, the “Praxic Finery.” It was like driving around on the Ark of the Covenant, but I treasure it and keep it in my Vault.

Taeko-3 died when she sacrificed her life so that we could take out the giant Shrieker that those damned Hive Wizards had summoned. She barely thought twice about doing it. Her Ghost was gone. She knew she wasn’t coming back. And with virtually no hesitation she let those wizards tear out her Light to make their twice-cursed Crystal. That crystal let us ruin their rituals once and for all. I would put a statue of her up in my Trophy Hall if I could.

And I’d put it right next to one of Cayde.

#21 BOSS FIGHT

So many bosses over the years. Some of them really memorable. Some I would kill to forget. Seriously, I would consider paying my Ghost, Tomar, to figure out a way to edit out some of those memories the next time he has to bring me back (which, granted, I hope is never again, but still.) Riven, Ghaul, Shuro Chi, Emperor Calus, that razzafrassin’ s.o.b. Vorgeth-The-Boundless-Hunger…there are too many to list. Raid Bosses, Mission Bosses, Dungeon Bosses, Lost Sector Bosses…honestly, you need a scorecard to keep track of all of them.

The fight I remember best, though, is the one I disliked the most: the fight to rescue Sedia the Corrupted, formerly Sedia the Techeun. She was the one boss we weren’t supposed to kill if we could possibly help it. Instead we had to pull her out of her corruption and save her from being Taken. She was Taken by Oryx after the Awoken battle in the rings of Saturn. Traveler, what an ordeal that was! She led us a merry chase across the Realms and when we finally caught up to her and knocked the Taken out of her, we never got so much as a “thank you” from her. 

After we got her out she did help with the resistance to the Curse in the Dreaming City, but she was always very prickly, very arrogant, very snide and sometimes outright rude, at least to me. I don’t know if it was an Awoken thing with Exos, or Hunters, or Guardians, or if it was a Tech Witch thing with Guardians in general.

All I know is that Petra owes me for that one, big time.

#22 HIVE

Whenever somebody says “Hive” the first thing I think of is what Drifter likes to say: “Bring a sword!” I asked him what he meant by that once. He just laughed in my face and said, “Brother, I have no idea!” I think it might be a sly reference to the Hive Sword Logic, but Drifter would never admit to it.

Still, I do always bring a sword.

The Hive embody the worst elements of everybody else who goes up against us. One-hit-kill snipers. Acolytes with their flaming grenades. (Where do they even keep them? Do they just hork them up?) The Knights (some of whom are absolute tanks); the Wizards and their damned rituals; the crazy fast mobs of cannon fodder Thralls; the Cursed suicide bombers; those monster cyclops Ogres with their eyebeams of death…and my least favorite of all — Shriekers.

I bloody hate Shriekers.

You can’t get up close and personal with a Shrieker. You have to get them from a distance. Not that I mind taking them out with a few well-placed exploding arrows or fusion blasts, but sometimes I just want to use my hands, you know? I want to punch one right in that orb thing of theirs. I just want to fly though that nasty spiral barrage they have, before they can unleash those monster tracking balls of death, and punch them ’til they pop.

Or failing that, use a sword.

#23 FAVORITE NPC

One of my favorite people in the System is Shiro-4. Shiro’s a freelance Vanguard, and Exo like me. There is no finer scout or tracker, not in the Hunters, not in the entire roster of Guardians. And there is nobody more generous. Shiro would give you the cloak off his back if you needed it.

You never see him at the Tower. I used to see him in the City sometimes, but not lately. He must be scouting something for Saladin or Zavala, unless the damned Pyramids got him. I hope not. He did do an awful lot of running back and forth to the Moon, though, so it’s not beyond the realm of possibility. If Eris knows anything about him, she’s not saying.

Shiro is the kind of upbeat friend who never lets you down, but never lets you get really close. Still, he never gave me bad advice. “Don’t get too cocky out there,” was one of his favorite sayings to me. Also, “You need anything, I’m here.” Kind of sums him up right there.

I won’t lie, I miss him. I hope he’s OK.

#24 CITY LIFE

The thing about being a Guardian is that, although we exist to protect the Last City…we are rarely truly part of it. Guardians don’t retire to a quiet home in the City. Oh, sure, there’s down time and public houses and ramen shops; there’s time spent in festivals in the Tower. But that’s just it. When we’re in the Last City, we are more than likely in the Tower. And the Tower ain’t the City. It’s Guardian Land.

I almost never get out into the actual City. Sometimes there’s Crucible training in the unoccupied ruins, but not a whole lot of interaction with the citizens. What you see in the ruins breaks your heart sometimes. The ruins aren’t all that…ruined. You can see shops and homes and lunch counters and all the other signs of a place that was once busy with people and life, but those people and that life are gone now.

The people in the Tower are from the City, and they are nice enough folks. Some are sightseeing, some hope to talk to a Guardian, some work there. Walk around and you’ll see your share of welders making repairs. There are folks doing whatever they do in the Bazaar. Some have business with New Monarchy or Dead Orbit. Some work in the Hangar with Holliday, restoring Sparrows or repairing ships. You occasionally see groups just hanging out and chatting. But do you know what you don’t see? You don’t see children.

To me, children are the heart of the City. That’s why I need to walk around outside of the Tower sometimes. To remind myself that the City is full of children, who have dreams and hopes and who, maybe, have a future if we do our job. You don’t get that when you stand on the parapet with Zavala looking down at the pretty lights. Yes, the Last City is beautiful, especially at night from the heights of the Tower. You see all kinds of distant activity. But you don’t see the people. And you don’t see the children.

#25 PYRAMID

I do not know what is going to become of us. Eris has been trying to decipher messages from the Darkness ever since she got that Artifact we recovered from the Pyramid on the Moon. She seems to think she’s able to use it to overhear their plans and secrets. Me, I think that when you listen to the Darkness, it listens back. 

I heard a Cryptarch say he believes that these same Pyramids caused the Collapse of the Golden Age. It took the Traveler nearly dying to keep them from exterminating us, and even so, we lost so much. It would also mean that they have been around for a long, long time. Longer than Humanity. Maybe longer than the Hive. And it seems that they want to undo everything the Traveler achieves. They’re certainly going after the planets most transformed by the Traveler’s arrival. The first time I was on Mercury and saw the size of the Pyramid ship there, the one that blots out the sun, I was beyond horrified. I know my Ghost, Tomar, has an unreasoning fear of them, ever since they tried to take him over on the Moon. I’ve never been inside the Traveler, don’t even know if that’s a thing, but I was inside the Pyramid on the Moon and I hope to never repeat the experience. It was empty, but…waiting. The halls and chambers are clearly designed for something approximately my size, but there’s nobody there. Unless you count the statue of the woman we found there. There was more to that than just stone. A lot more.

I’m a Nightstalker. I use and listen to the Void. This Darkness from the Pyramids is different. Bad. More than just the Light’s opposite, the Traveler’s opposite. I don’t know how we’ll beat this one. I don’t know if we can.

#26 EVACUATION

The Pyramids are here. The Darkness is here. The eons-old enemy of the Traveler has followed it and arrived…here. They took out Rasputin. Anything we throw at them just…disappears with no effect. They slipped past the outer planets and just went on to their destinations, the planets that were touched by the Traveler when it arrived here before the Golden Age. Now they’re just sitting, on Mercury, on Mars, on Io, on Titan. Waiting. Zavala decided that our response should be to pull back. This doesn’t sit right with me or with my Ghost. But we are Vanguard and we follow what I hope to the Traveler is a plan.

We got a lot of tech and supplies pulled from the Lighthouse and from Io, Mars and Titan. We had less success with evacuating our people. Brother Vance, Asher Mir and Sloane decided not to come back to the Tower. Only Ana Bray agreed to be evacuated, from Mars, with some pieces that might or might not let us get Rasputin the Warmind back. And I think that if Rasputin had stayed online, Ana would have stayed behind too. The other three apparently don’t agree with falling back and are staying to fight the Darkness on their own terms, in the places they know best.

I wonder if Zavala knew that this was going to happen. If he realized that there was no way a Titan like Sloane would retreat if there was any chance of taking the fight to the Darkness. If he realized that Asher was too ornery to ever leave Io, or that Vance would never let the Infinite Forest fall to the Pyramids. I could have told him that there was no way Vance was going to do anything that made him less than a hero in the eyes of his idol, Osiris.

It all feels wrong. And too late I’m realizing that these people were my friends, and that I’m going to miss them, terribly.

#27 TAKEN

“Gilfan, what just happened?” Tomar asked me, the first time we saw a Cabal being Taken. I didn’t have an answer. We saw a whirlpool of nothing open up and the Legionary that was next to it was just…sucked away. Was it targeted, or just in the wrong place at the worst time? Who knows? Not me.

Once a being is Taken, what happens to it? Is it transformed? Transformed into a negative version of itself? Replaced? Possessed? Eris uses terms like “rendered” but I’m not sure what she means. I know that under certain conditions, you can, well, take back a Taken. We did it with Sedia the Corrupted. The same kind of whirlpool of nothing opened up next to her, just as we wore her down to nothing, and that shadow or negative light or whatever it was that filled her was drawn back into its realm. What came back was Sedia the Tech Witch. I don’t think she was the same, but she was definitely not the shrieking horror of darkness that she had been moments before. That’s the only time I’ve seen it happen, though. Every other Taken just vanishes back into nothing. I don’t think anything else has ever come back.

With Oryx gone, are beings still being Taken? Is it just some kind of unfortunate natural process, like spontaneous combustion? I don’t think so. There are too many of them, more now than ever, it seems. Something is behind it still. Something is going on within that realm. Defeating the King did not make the Taken go away. Does it have to do with the Darkness Itself now that the Pyramids have arrived? What is inside that whirlpool of nothing? Would the Light even shine there? Could it?

I’m terrified of ever finding out.

#28 STASIS

I keep hearing whispers about something new. Stasis. If Gunslinging wields the power of the Sun and light and heat, and wielding Arc energy harnesses the lightning, then Stasis is supposed to be about cold and ice. But it doesn’t come from the same place as the other energies, not even the Void.

Eris Morn says that this is a power we have to master, a darkness from the Darkness that will help us fight the Darkness. Like in the old saying, fighting fire with fire. The only problem with fighting fire with fire is that all too often everybody gets burned.

So even though the Pyramids have Jupiter boxed in between Mars and Saturn, it looks like we’ll be going to Europa soon. Europa. A big ball of ice about the size of our own Luna. More water than all of Earth’s oceans combined, covered in ice 15 miles thick. To see about Stasis. Well, if there was a place in the Solar System where you would learn about ice and freezing, it would be this place.

Stasis. It had better be worth it.

#29 DESPAIR

I see it in Petra Venj’s eyes. Despair. I think she knows that the Dreaming City will never be free of Riven’s curse. Her people, never numerous, scattered since the Battle of Saturn, now fighting a futile war against forces so cosmic that a little Exo mind like mine can hardly grasp them. She will never see her Queen in this realm again. Mara Sov was turned to dust at Saturn and is now exiled to her throneworld in Eleusinia. I don’t think Petra has been there. I don’t think Petra wants to see her Queen. She talks about fighting the good fight, but there is a sadness to her that no amount of bravado can completely hide. Her beautiful City, overrun by Hive and Scorn and Taken, and doomed to repeat an endless cycle of blight that can only be beaten back a bit, and only for a little while.

I also feel despair, for Petra herself. She will never let herself be free of her responsibilities. Never have any adventures in the field again. She is Mara’s Regent, and even though she hates being forced into a leadership role, she will do her best, all the while blaming herself for everything bad that has happened.

She will never know joy again, and it breaks my heart to see it.

#30 HOPE

Hope is a dangerous thing for a Guardian to have. It is so often snatched away from us. We hoped when we broke the Red Legion and disabled the sunkiller in their Almighty that we were done with them. But they had one last card to play, aiming their moon-sized ship at the Last City. We hoped we’d have time to build enough weapons for Rasputin to throw so that the City would be saved. That time it was, but not without leaving still more scars on our Tower and on our land.

I hoped Eris would find something, anything, to help us with the Darkness. Maybe she has, but I hesitate to put too much of my heart there.

Still, it is as they say: “Hope springs eternal.” Sometimes it turns out to be worth it. We never gave up on finding Saint-14 and pulling him from the timeline where he died, and in spite of everything Osiris and Vance and Ikora said, we did it. Now he feeds his pigeons and runs his Trials and, I think, finds a bit of peace at last. For once, our hopes weren’t dashed.

Other hopes are too dangerous for me to entertain. I can’t dare hope to see Cayde again. I can’t dare hope that we can use the Forest to save the Speaker the way we did Saint. And I’m afraid to hope that the Vanguard will hold together without a Hunter. I see the toll it takes on Zavala. The pressure is breaking him, slowly, I think. And Ikora just stands in the Bazaar in meditation, rarely speaking, never asking for help from anyone any more. She is breaking, too; just in a different way.

But yes, I hope that what I saw when the Pyramid took me to the Garden was just illusion. I hope we find something on Europa that helps us. I hope Stasis is not another false promise. I hope that the Traveler has something new to aid us. And I hope I am strong enough to cope with whatever comes next, whatever new menace is thrown at us. Because that’s what life as a Guardian is. We go from threat to threat and we hope that through our efforts the City still stands.

Maybe that’s the true source of the Light. Hope.

#31 YOUR CHOICE

My name is GLFan-2814. I go by Gilfan, or Gil. My Ghost is Tomar. I am an Exo Hunter. I am a middle-tree Nightstalker, a Shadowdancer, a Voidwielder. I have learned that before I was Risen I fell fighting the Darkness during the great Collapse at the end of the Golden Age. As my first life was ending I somehow made my way to a Bray facility and chose to become Exo.

Something went wrong. My Exo self did not reboot. Maybe that’s where my high number comes from: 2,814 failed attempts to boot up. I don’t think that’s so; I think it means something entirely different, but I kept the number anyway. It feels special. And it always raises an eyebrow when I tell people who I am. “Gilfan-1” just doesn’t have the same cachet.

I lay buried in a sub-basement for an age. More than an age. I became Risen when my Ghost found me. It was a bad time. Cabal were searching the facility, for what I don’t know. Maybe it was me. I woke in a strange new body, not knowing who I was, where I was, what I was, what Tomar was. Somehow Tomar got me moving. We found a weapon, an old scout rifle, and somehow I fought my way out to the surface, through dozens of Legionaries and Psions and Warbeasts. We found an old jump ship, half buried in the orange sand. It was pure luck. A day earlier and it would have been buried and hidden. A day later and it would have vanished again. That day, though, the wind uncovered enough of it for Tomar to transmat me aboard and get me to the Tower.

I learned what it meant to be a Hunter in the Vanguard. I made friends. I also lost friends. What I’ve never learned is much about my previous life. I know I have a gift for manipulating paracausal energies, creating energy constructs out of light. I don’t know if that was true before, but it feels like it might have been. I have a feeling that it was something special, something uncommon, but something that I chose to do. I know that I am not the smartest Hunter, or the most able, or the deadliest, or the most subtle. I try to be someone who can be relied upon to do the job. I won’t give up. I won’t quit on you. That’s who I am. My choice. Nobody else’s.

I choose my own Destiny.


End file.
